May 1, 2012 – So, less than 24 hours before today's dawn of the of the new groundfishing season, the benevolent National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration boldly announced Monday it would try to ease fishermen's pain by allow mid-sized vessels to use new gear designed to limit the bycatch of yellowtail flounder.
That might sound like a good thing, as fishermen out of Gloucester and other New England ports confront what truly looms as a crisis year.
Yet let's never forget that NOAA and its parent U.S. Department of Commerce have not only refused to grant the very realistic economic disaster declaration sought by Gov. Deval Patrick and backed by U.S. Sen John Kerry and others. Commerce officials, following true to the form of NOAA administrator Jane Lubchenco, haven't even shown the respect or decency to respond to the requests.
And let's especially not forget the most shameless slap in the face to fishermen and their backers, inside and outside Congress and state houses around New England and beyond. That's the fact that this fishery "crisis" — supposedly in cod, yellowtail and now even sturgeon, a fish that's suddenly been declared an endangered species without NOAA undertaking a single trawl study or other stock assessment — is an economic disaster that's been created by NOAA from the start.
That's right, folks. Our own federal government — led, of course, by a president who continues to stress his purported push for "jobs, jobs, jobs" — is the single driving force in the absolute decimation of fishermen's and other waterfront jobs, and the hits those policies have wreaked on fishing communities such as Gloucester, New Bedford and so many others.
Read the full editorial at the Gloucester Times.